


Meet as Old Friends

by Berd_Alert (Cassa_of_the_fans), excessThinking (Nobodyhasblindedme)



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Historical, Alternia as an actual place with culture, Canon Rewrite, Corpses, Death Rituals, Discussions of death, Gen, M/M, Mortuary, Pale Romance | Moirallegiance, Wakes & Funerals
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-12
Updated: 2020-06-12
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:01:55
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,811
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24675790
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cassa_of_the_fans/pseuds/Berd_Alert, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nobodyhasblindedme/pseuds/excessThinking
Summary: Gamzee has become an adult and must begin preforming his service to the Hive. His palemate is very supportive.
Relationships: Gamzee Makara/Karkat Vantas
Comments: 4
Kudos: 22
Collections: Alternia Re-bound: A Guide to Everything Trollish





	Meet as Old Friends

**Author's Note:**

> Hey there! This is Berd. Before this fic gets started I wanted to clear up a few things. This fic takes place in a pre-imperial version of Alternia that Think and I are currently working on. As such, there might be some things that potentially cause some confusion. We'll be releasing a worldbuilding bible at some point in the future, but for now, here's what you need to know:
> 
> Clade: this is a troll family unit, consisting of quadranted adults and their offspring. Clades usually number 8-12 people.
> 
> Mat and Dau: these are the Alternian words for "mother" and "father" respectively. 
> 
> The Purples: before the imperial regime, Purple trolls were the caste that tended to the dead. This evolved into a religious place in troll society. They don't have the clown iconography yet, that comes later - in one timeline with the corruption of Doc Scratch, and the other simply with the adoption of more bloody and intolerant ideals post-imperial takeover.
> 
> Candy Reds (and Limes): Candy Red mutants are considered holy beings, and are pretty much guaranteed places in the religious life of the community. This is why Karkat mentions handling offerings in the temple. The Candy Reds work alongside limes, who, as opposed to purples, care for the living members of the community.
> 
> The Mother: this refers to both the colony's Mothergrub, who at this point in troll history is decidedly more sentient than the canon version; biologically, a literal queen of their hive. This also refers to a religious figure called the Mother of Mothers. She is thought to be the goddess from which all trolls come, and to which they must return.
> 
> The Judges: These are death gods, similar to Anubis and Thoth in egyptian myth. They judge the souls of dead trolls and either allow them to return to the Mother of Mothers, or deem them unworthy and send them to be reincarnated. They will eventually become the Mirthful Messiahs, (ie, Calliope and Caliborn the Church will idolize in the game timeline.)
> 
> And that's about it! If you need any clarification, please comment below and we'll answer to the best of our ability!
> 
> Thinker: alternatively titled: ‘So You Bit The Big One: a guide to troll funerals for the (hopefully) uninitiated.’

\--------

Karkat adjusts a strand of hair and looks at Gamzee in their ablution block mirror.

"You look very handsome. I'm proud of you."   
  
The two trolls are seated in the room, Karkat just behind the taller, hands fastening the last of the delicate hairpieces. White bone shone in the dim light, the tiny skull of some chirpbeast accented in silver inlay holding the long coifs of braids together. Bone beads adorned them in patterns, at the ones braided at the front as well.They’d started a while ago, and were only now finished.   
  
Busy hands had been at the front as well. Gamzee’s fingers were damp where a cloth had wiped away the paint from his fingertips. It now lined his eyes in delicate swoops and strokes of a small brush. Practiced for years to perfection.   
  
A marker of a pallbearer and deathkeeper, but a source of new pride nonetheless. Honor, finally, to his ramshackle self.

Gamzee cannot cry. He doesn't have time to mess up and fix the paint now - but his throat feels tight. He turns and grabs the smaller troll up in a hug, careful. The robes are not his to keep yet, and to be returned to Temple when this night is over. 

"And you, little brother.." he mumbles into the shaggy hair. "No mined diamond could shine so bright.."

Karkat grunts into the hug, grumbling something appropriately grouchy before wigging away from grabby hands and gives Gamzee a little peck under his jaw, where he won't smear the paint.

"Love you too. Now come on, we don't want to be late."   


-  
  
Karkat and him walk along the streets and over the causeways connecting clades and public courtyards and open markets. People mill about, chattering to each other in the cool, dark air of the hive. Above, far above in the massive cavern twinkle little glowbugs on the ceiling, an evernight sky here where the Light cannot reach. Trolls sweep out front stoops, catty baskets of goods in and out. Wigglers tag along their parent’s heels, chewing on toys or snacks, little tails wagging at every sight at sound.    
  
More than once, someone will glance their way, and move aside, even if there is plenty of room to be had already. Gamzee can feel it. Their fear. Their startling hesitation at his Face, his clothes.    
  
There’s only one reason for his kind to be out and about dressed as such.    
  
They come to a split in the path, one leading downwards, and the other up. 

"I suppose I'll catch you for a morning brew later, bro," he drawls, words of prayer and the correct motions going through his head. " 'f I don't see ya 'round Temple first."

Karkat squeezes his hand, then lets go.

"I have to help Dau with offerings tonight, so you might. I'll light a candle for you."

“Thanks, always.”

They part ways. 

Gamzee watches the other trot back down into the cool depths, tail flicking back and forth. Shame, these days, how they have to catch each other in these little seconds of time. And after today, it will only become moresoe... 

The humming he'd been feeling since a night and a half ago slithers back into place, thoughts of pale nights and soft hands wandering over faces and a delicate pair of lips brushing his hornbeds in the dark and quiet a thing for a far later time. 

Gripping and shivering in his horns, his face, his shoulders, like a blow to his own skull.

_ Death has come. And you must come for It.  _

-

The clade is a hunter house. Gamzee stands at the back of a group of six others like himself.

They watch as their leader starts the last rites. A bowl of water from the family's cistern stands beside them, strips of cloth and unlit candles and sticks of incense. The troll who has died fell on the tusks of a boarbeast. Their stomach is still caked in blood and mud. The lead priest lights a stick of incense, and instructs that they take turns cleaning and Caring for the body.

Gamzee watches the others. There is a small chant called up, the leader leading and others - himself - falling into a quiet rhythm, about life, and death, and the turning of the world. For now, it is only to time the work, each taking their share. The blessings will be laid when the body is taken below. 

He loses himself to it a little. The come and go of the words. Layering his in with the others and letting them slip past his lips as his mind finds their meaning like a river of black. Eyes lidded, someone breaks the semi-trance with a small touch to his arm. 

A cloth is handed to him, and Gamzee shuffles forward. 

The trolls isn't very old - not much older than Gamzee himself. They're missing a horn from the nasty fall, stump unwrapped, naked, as is the rest of them. Across their body, their arms and hands and legs, he can see scars. From a life slaying the beasts that eventually slayed him. Some scars were in patterns - purposefully put there, in cross crossing knots and vine-like entanglements across the body. Love in a knife wound. 

Their ears had piercings, though one had been violently ripped free - a spade or a heart. In the other room with the rest of the clade, mourning, perhaps. He damps the cloth in the cold water. Being one the last, there isn't much left to clean. Gamzee wipes the face clear, small scrapes washed, smoothing out the lines of the last agony of falling. 

They will be allowed some peace. Some rest.

For now. 

_ In this world, there is only one True rest, and Mother-willing, we all find it someday. _

Eventually, he's ushered back, and their leader brings forth a pot of the same white Gamzee and the others wear, and will wear for now and into their own dying days.

With brushes, soft and gentle, they paint the body white. More prayers are spoken, more incense is burned. They press herbs and scrolls of paper inscribed with spellwork to bring the soul peace into the fatal wound. 

Gamzee's ears flick, change imperceptible but there all the same and he looks up. 

There's a child in the doorway. They have the horns of the troll he's attending to. A child or a sibling. Their eyes are wide. Gamzee's hands freeze over the body.

They freeze as their small, grey child's eyes meet his, almost fully deep amethyst. Almost fully an adult. 

They looks lost, and afraid. For a moment, Gamzee feels more than the ache of  _ deathdeathdeath _ and the tremor of the chants in his bones. Far away, from here, from this time, he remembers the cold stone, a purring pile of hatchmates not far away but him alone still desolate.

A warmth. A soothing, rough downpitch purr so hard in the tiny body making it it might as well have been a friendly growl. Always there. It never left Gamzee's side. 

He was never alone again. 

He holds out a hand.

Eyes not so many shades different then Gamzee’s watch the little spectacle. The little troll steps forward, tentative, hesitant. Gamzee purrs softly.

"S'alright. C'mere."

He knows what he looks like right now. The Face changes how he looks, how they all do. The robes are dark, layer upon layer of the deepest colors. The bones in their hair and in strands about their necks and arms. What it must feel like to have six of all them 'voodoos up in this small space. 

The child is brave though. They press on, eyes wide at the sight of their Mat or Dau. The dead troll must look strange to them. 

Gamzee lets them get as close as they're going to get. 

They seem surprised they were allowed to stay.

"Can I see my Dau? Please? Mat said you were going to fix him."

Gamzee's eyes flicker to the other members. Their chant is now little more than a low hum in the back of their throats. The final stages of the ritual have yet to be done, but those will be seen to once the body's in the ground. The head priest and another break away to fetch the pall. 

He turns to the child. "..You're Mat's right. Gonna get all fixed. But, it ain't us what's gonna be making the real stitchin' and mendin'." 

He nods to the bed, the dead ready. A few more brushstrokes, mindful of the blood on the broken horn, and it's done. "You'll have to be sayin' farewells though, 'afor that can happen, little one. I'm unfortunately saying," Gamzee says as gently as he can.

The little troll's eyes well with green tears. "I know he's not coming back. I just- I want to see him. Please?"

Trolls wrap their dead in shrouds if the death was violent. This is the last chance they'll have to see their Dau's face.

Gamzee considers. He's..already technically done a lot of things he'll likely be spoken to about...and the age of the troll will probably keep his reprimand short..

"'Course," he says. He turns to his fellow members. 

They eye the child as well. And step aside, making a clear path to the bed.

The little one is barely tall enough to reach the top of the bed, but they stand on tiptoe so they can see their Dau. They purr in the back of their throat, leaning over to nuzzle the body's cheek.

"I miss you Dau. Matti misses you too. She says you're going to go to the Mother now. I hope you make it." They still, pressing their forehead against their parents. "Love you." 

They step away, their face smudged white.

"Thank you, sir."

Something dour tells him Karkat's going to have a pile-full today with the gangly purple..and Gamzee is sorry for it.

He just nods to them, watches then retreat quickly from the room, the green-tinged tears finally leaving wet tracks on their face, and he wonders after that smudge of white. On a child’s face, even...

He hopes he won't have to see the inside of this clade for a long while. The leering eyes of predators dance in the candlelight from the walls and ceiling though in beautiful mural and relief, a testament to the clade's pride. They gaze down on the dead troll on the bed, hunting them even in death.Such is a hunter’s calling.

One can hope. 

The head priest is back with the pall and shroud. He lingers on Gamzee as they pass, something unreadable under the Face and thick ropes of braid. 

They finish preparing the body quickly after that. As they're carrying it out to the families burial plot he catches sight of the little troll, being held by their Mat. A lime troll with tired eyes. Her heart earring is a black stud, instead of the usual finely wrought glass. That would explain the child's bravery. If they have lime blood, it would mean that the voodoos don't make quite so strong an impact.

"So fucking reckless,” he thinks he catches the sound of. “Too proud - always sure you could get something bigger, stronger, fatter. Well. I suppose you had the last laugh with that tuskbeast..Victory in death, my love. Yitous, you wonderful fool..."

They pass, and leave the family to begin their mourning.

-

To the river that runs at the very base of the main hive, in the deep, the dark. The brooding caverns are even above them now, and the white, bare walls high on either side of them echo their footsteps into endlessness. Here the pathway is smooth stone worn by countless, untold eons of gentle, black waters, running off into some unknown depth even trolls don't have a right to follow into. 

The lamps are lit along the way already, as the path deviates. Gamzee can feel his horns ache with the pulsing inside his own head, of the others. Of the wet soil on either side of the walkways now.

The earth grows soft beneath their feet where flagstones are not present. The burial grounds surround them. There are other priests here, tending to other plots, other bodies. There's a hole already dug for them, only a few feet deep, the corners lit by blue lamplight. 

They lay the body in the pit, and one of their number steps forward. From a bag they produce the grave goods that will be laid to rest with the troll. Polished horn bangles, pelts of animal hide, the troll’s spear, broken at the spearhead, a matched set of glass earrings, and a doll, made in the shape of a hopbeast. His life and that of his loved ones, all accounted for. All remembered. Their leader starts a chant to ensure his safe journey towards the Judges and the Mother beyond. They start to fill the grave.

Gamzee's fingers sink into the tended ground. It's well kept, much like the fertile lands above the keepers of the field that give them all daily life. Again, he loses himself to the chant - he's practiced in his head how many dozen times? But it's nothing compared to how it weaves in with other voices now, the tapestry of mourning and celebration and acknowledging that which no being can ever run from, so must work to face with courage and dignity when it corners them a final time. 

At a small stone above the head of the interned troll, the leader places a bowl of oil, and lights the wick. Three times over it will be refilled, and no more. What physical remains of the troll will be taken to the Temple, for have Sign and Karkat and others keep them until their fate is ultimately seen. 

Gamzee shoves the last handful into place. Only the leader is still swaying a bit, in their fugue. 

"Come," says one of the others, a younger retainer a sweep or two older than Gamzee. They hold out a hand to him.

He takes it, and stands. They leave the burial ground and the demeanor of the group changes. It's less graven, a little more casual. He's still tense though, waiting for the reprimand he's sure is coming. But the head priest makes no indication he intends to do anything. 

They return to the temple. 

Gamzee catches sight of Karkat in the entry Hall. The candy troll is dressed in his attendants uniform, helping a wriggler light a prayer candle. He doesn't look up as their group walks past, focused on the child as he is.

A part of him wants to call out, to break away and find that rough purr. Find that blazing warmth of his little red inferno away from the cold little pit that's forming in his innards, but Gamzee remains calm. He's seven damn sweeps old, he and Karkat are both working now, servants to their higher causes. He's proud the impulse doesn't find ground in his head, as it had so many times in the past and caused the worst uproars.

They move through the space like ghosts, dark in the softly lit rooms, until the public spaces pass and they deviate into the store rooms. 

Stacks of candles, loose paper for prayers to burn, incense and matches and idols in their holy boxes only presented at holidays. The group begins to strip down, thick robes folded and tucked away in the boxes marked for cleaning.

The mood is subdued, but the other trolls are talking quietly. Someone places a hand on Gamzee's shoulder.

"A word, brother?"

Gamzee tries not to startle like a squeakbeast at the hand, but his thoughts all beginning to tangle like unkempt strands of silk do nothing for his attention to almost-silent footsteps into a small, quiet room. 

He turns, and the lead priest is staring down at him. It's only then Gamzee starts to feel how..small, he is, in this room. The others, even the youngest among them, is older than he by sweeps. Under the gaze of the old purple, without the heavy robes, he feels very much like a wiggler himself. 

...After his stunt today, maybe he is. 

"Sure," he gulps, and as quick as he can manage without tearing anything (too badly - sorry Kanaya..) he dresses down into the daily tunic and pants he was instructed to keep here. He follows the old troll out, too-aware of the eyes at his back.

They walk together to a private office. The old troll sits down at a writing desk. There are no other chairs.

"Do you know why you are here, Brother Makara?"

Standing alone, even sitting the older troll is as tall as Gamzee feels. And he doesn't feel very tall at all, at the moment. He tries not to look down, or past him, or like a scolded kid what got caught with their hand in the berrypot. 

Funnily enough, Sign comes to mind, sternfaced but gentle, frustrated at his son and his son's wayward diamond's insane antics but holding back as much laughter as Dis at the report that the two of them had been jumping across rooftops trying to catch a skyrider they'd accidentally let loose into the hive and it was cra-

Gamzee blinks back to the present. 

The sternfacedness is about where the similarities ended, really. The cold pit was back, at the new thought of what Sign's face would look like when he..inevitably heard. Far worse. 

"...I reckon it's on the account I did all what wasn't told of me. Broke what never should be cracked even." He might as well just say it.. "Fucked up."

The trolls lips twitch. He leans back in his chair. 

"You know, I recall a certain other trainee pulling a similar stunt. Allowing a family member to see their dearly departed's body. The trolls moirail, instead of her wriggler." He pauses, shuffles some papers. "That trainee was your Dau, Makara. Let's just say I had a reckoning that something like this might transpire. Your lines always been soft, more lenient than most."

He stands, and walks over to Gamzee, placing both his hands on the boys' skinny shoulders.

"I'll tell you what I told him, brother. Leave the living to the limes. They'll do a sight better in taking care of 'em. You focus on tending to the dead, y'hear me?"

Ironically, at the heavy hands on his shoulders, Gamzee feels. Lighter. 

His. 

His Dau. He can barely remember the troll - lost when he was barely pupated. He..recalls hands like those on his shoulders now..a voice like thunder threatening the horizon. A massive dark shape, but. It's gone as soon as it had come. 

As the older troll pulls away with another definitive nod, Gamzee suddenly wants to chase after. Ask more. What..was he like? What was his work like? 

Where did he go? 

The lead priest cannot read minds though, he's not the Mother... Instead, he swipes up one of the papers he was shuffling around on the table, folding it and holding it out for the younger to take. "Your assignments, for the coming weeks, Brother Makara. Others will assist you if you have questions."

He tilts his head towards the door. "You may go."

Gamzee takes the paper and nods, murmuring his thanks, and then he leaves. He doesn't look at the papers just yet, he wants to go home and take a minute to just relax before he reads them. It's almost midnight anyway, Karkat will be at home waiting for him.

He doesn't remember much of the walk home. If he gets looks in the streets, he doesn't even feel them. His body feels, all at once, keyed up and lagging. Like it can't decide if it's cold or warm. 

Karkat, he wants Karkat..and pile. And something to take the edge away..

Slipping inside, flipping off his shoes to lay somewhere near the entrance in a fashion Rosa will likely have something to say about later but he can face her 'wrath' later.. Trotting into the living space, he's met, thankfully, only with Sollux who looks up from the table at him, blinking those jemlike eyes. There's a frame before him, a stylus in hand and little shavings of wax on the floor and table, some project or another that required mistakes erased. He doesn't try to speak to Gamzee at least, the worst he does only raising an eyebrow.

Clambering down into the nestblock and seeing the resting form of Karkat tending to a little bowl of coals and a steaming kettle had never looked more like paradise.

Karkat doesn't startle as Gamzee wraps his arms around him and pushes his face into his neck. He does snip at him though.

"You're gonna get paint all over me, you pan-rotted beanpole. How was it?"

Gamzee breathes in the scent of his moirail. Tallow, smoke, sweet from the incense always there these days, but the fresh, clean scent of bath and folded laundry. Gamzee folds himself about the smaller troll. He smiles into the fluff of hair at the words, the gravelly tone; familiar, lovely. The beginning of all this seemed so long ago..

"Mm..coulda been worse.." He says. Leaves off the implied 'could have been better' and hopes Karkat isn't a sleuth on the prowl tonight. 

“Well don’t sound so excited,” Karkat hums, shaking a small tin of something sweet and spicy, leaves and cloves of spice. He glances over his shoulder. “You should get undressed. Don’t have anywhere to be.” 

The strings at the bottom of his pants are digging into his skin, now that he thinks about it..and buttons don’t feel great to lie on. 

Gamzee is loath to shuffle off his diamond right then, but..well. The promise of something better then a one-way hug Karkat knows how to dangle better then any animal driver. Who is Gamzee but the brainless beast to follow? 

Clothes are indeed shed. Spoonfuls of leaves are scooped into the pot and watched for long moments. Automatically, a baking prayer comes to Gamzee’s head as he waits half-undressed and covered by sheets in bed.

Karkat huffs as he eventually presents a steaming cup to the troll. “Will you stop that mumbling? With you around I can hardly hear my own thoughts, and Mother knows what you’ve got up there that the world apparently needs to hear.” 

The smaller body lays back beside him, ushering him down. The bed is cool, the tea is warm. 

Gamzee lets his eyes close for a moment, and drifts in the black. He'll get up soon, his Face to be removed now that he’s not in public, and chores still to do. 

But for now, he rests.

  
  



End file.
